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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23588950">A Truth Felt but Not Yet Spoken</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/xbedhead/pseuds/xbedhead'>xbedhead</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Newsroom (US TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Gen, Light Angst, Post-Season 2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 23:14:39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>682</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23588950</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/xbedhead/pseuds/xbedhead</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-Election Night Part II. Will has a lot to explain. And sometimes trying to say it outright isn't the best approach for him. </p><p>Mac finds something that Will has been working on.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Will McAvoy/MacKenzie McHale</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Truth Felt but Not Yet Spoken</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>A quick one I hammered out as a solution to Will having been an absolute <i>dick</i> to Mac for several years before they got engaged. A lot of time between seasons 2 &amp; 3, so we can safely assume that a number of discussions were had to put them on equal footing going into wedding planning and home shopping and generally progressing in their relationship. </p><p>Unbeta'd, so mistakes are on me.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>A Truth Felt but Not Yet Spoken</strong>
</p><p>She’s looking for a pen when she finds it, under several bills and stock reports piled on his desk. No matter that Will is surrounded by technology, he grew up drafting things by hand and then transferring the finished product to the typewriter, then the computer. Old dogs and all. His yellow legal pad has several pages folded back, each one filled with haphazard scrawl, complete with notes in the side columns and bold strikes through entire paragraphs.</p><p>The pen she needs is beneath the notepad, forgotten as she glances over the words, pulling meaning from them in a matter of seconds until she’s flipping back the pages to the start. She mouths the words aloud, a frown forming from her brows.</p><p>
  <em>Though a part of me did, I never consciously meant to hurt you, but know that I did – and deeply. For that, I can never apologize enough. </em>
</p><p>She brings her fingertips to her lips, parted in shock as she speed reads through the page, dazed.</p><p>
  <em>
    <strike>When I think of all the time wasted </strike>
  </em>
  <em> <strike>When I think of the way I’ve wasted the last years</strike>  When I think of how I’ve treated you the last few years, of how much time I’ve wasted and how much pain I’ve caused you, I can’t help but wonder why you would have ever agreed to marry me. It’s a reminder now and forever how much better of a person you are than me. I’ve hurt you repeatedly; you hurt me once. <strike>It’s not a matter of keeping score</strike> <strike>I know I shouldn’t keep score, but this is</strike> – </em>
</p><p>When she flips the page, her hands are shaking.</p><p>Will’s proposal had come only two days prior and, aside from a night-and-a-half’s worth of restless sleep and a pitiful attempt at a meaningful conversation before they both gave in to exhaustion, neither had fully processed the titanic shift in their relationship. Both of them were still reeling from the sudden change, not to mention in and out of meetings with lawyers and Charlie and Leona and Reese and anyone else who stood to lose something because of Genoa.</p><p>
  <em>Brian. My contract. Nina. The half a dozen other women I paraded around the bullpen. I have no excuse. None. Except that I’m a small man too dense to know how to process <strike>the hurt I felt</strike>  <strike>was feeling</strike>  the hurt I couldn’t let go. For a long time, holding onto that kind of hurt was what kept me going. It’s what kept me safe. But I want you to know I don’t want to live like that anymore. <strike>I want to do better</strike>  <strike>I want to be better</strike>  I want to do better by you. I want you to understand that, in every way, MacKenzie, you make me a better man. </em>
</p><p>There’s more. Scribbled paragraphs about Afghanistan and riots and something in the side column about emails. Feeling strangely settled, MacKenzie lowers the pad, the thudding of her heart like a timpani drum resonating throughout her body. She replaces the pen on the desk, covers it with the pad, then moves the stack of papers back to where they had been before she’d begun her hunt. Even though this was obviously written for her, it wasn’t hers to read; not yet. Maybe Will would rewrite it, print it neatly on weighted paper – or better yet, he’d voice the apology himself, no doubt after rehearsing it numerous times.</p><p>For as comfortable as he was on camera and in the moment, when it came to matters of his heart, things he <em>desperately</em> wanted to get right, Will was often a jumble of words and a twisted tongue. His childhood stutter returned with a vengeance and ears burned bright red from lobe to tip.</p><p>Speaking truth to his feelings meant vulnerability – and Will didn’t do vulnerability. Not often.</p><p>As Mac slips from the darkened bedroom – <em>their</em> bedroom now – she glances back at the desk, to the yellow legal pad she sees peeking out.</p><p>It doesn’t erase everything – how could it?</p><p>But it’s a start.</p>
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